Just Gold
by HartxStarr
Summary: Law's got issues. He's fifteen. - Post-Apocalypse type AU (or, the years following)


"Law, are you religious?"

He wasn't, not anymore at least. And he was about to answer with just that when another thought suddenly came to him — that a question of that nature should have been asked and known long ago. And he found it... odd, that even after several years, there were still trivial little things they have yet to discover about one another; even after they've moved on from one world to another, their rundown apartment with its faulty pipes and creaky floorboards, there were little questions sprinkled throughout the day that Rosinante managed into an interval or somehow worked into a conversation.

And it was curious — this question especially, considering that they had explored more than one abandoned house of worship of varying degrees of decay in their time in the trees. He had never asked him anything then, so why now of all times, while he was dishing out his dinner?

Though, if he thought about it, Rosinante didn't have the best of timing, so there was that.

Law took an extra minute ladling out his soup — chicken and rice, Roci's payday was in two days so it was quite literally chicken and rice — and mulled over the words he'd choose.

"No," he said. Then, after a lull, "We had a common religion in my country." A shrug, "I don't really— practice it anymore." A moment more. "I don't know," he added softly, because he had no idea where the question had come from or what else to say; felt as if he _should_ say something, anything to fill the void of suspended seconds he had suddenly fallen into.

He didn't know if he had done anything recently that would allude to a particular faith or not, or whatever it was that prompted Roci to question him in the first place. And on the heels of that thought came another — whatever it was, was Rosinante upset about it?

Law didn't know Roci's stance on religion — a suddenly alarming fact now that he had realized it — and, as the eternity of seconds dragged on, he rapidly began assuming the worst. Did Roci hate religion? Would he kick him out for having once followed one? What if he didn't so much as hate religion but every religion but his own? Was he even religious?

He felt the cold sensation of dread bleed out from his thoughts, and he had half the mind to think he was going to throw up. Panicking, Law startled — will he be alone again?

Bile caught in his throat at the thought and between one trembling breath and the next, he found himself stumbling through a forest, a cold shock of anesthetic fresh in his system given to him through a wave of blaze and bullets, blood thrown stark against blinding white.

He was vaguely aware of his shirt clinging to his back, but he didnt care — didn't care about anything at all, not the ringing in his ears or the invisible weights that kept him from lifting his feet properly, causing him to trip every other step he took. He didn't care about the blood that wasn't his on his ruined clothes, or the fact that they were ruined at all, all he cared about was—

"I was just wondering," Rosinante spoke up from his spot on the couch, and Law didn't doubt for a second that the man had said something to stop Law from convulsing on the spot. It snapped him back to reality and he watched as his companion began attentively stirring his own bowl and, from his posture, Law couldn't get a good look at his face. He couldn't see his eyes and, to Law, that wasn't all that reassuring.

But — "I never asked that about you." The light timbre of his voice is what lifted the heavy veil of insecurities from his mind, and Law found his head tilting as he listened to his companion speak. "I was curious — we visted a few abandoned churches a few times, remember?"

He couldn't manage to find his voice no matter how hard he tried, so he swallowed around nothing instead and nodded his head in answer.

"Well, my brother told me that in his country—"

And just like that, Law ceased to care immediately. He had no interest in learning anything about his companion's brother or the country in which he rules, and anything he had to say was never of importance to him, nor should it ever matter to Rosinante. That sort of life was another world entirely; it didn't have anything to do with trees or dirt, or starry skies or cracks in concrete. It didn't have anything to do with them at all.

A nearby stack of open letters sat on the kitchen counter and its existence seemed to bore into him; with each new addition Law found his uncomfortably-comfortable life start twisting, shaping into an outcome he didn't want to think about — _couldn't_ think about without his thoat tightening and the prospect of convulsing well within reach again.

Turning on his heel, he left his bowl at the stove and made for his room. The rest of Roci's sentence was silenced by the door slamming shut, and for the split second after, Law remembered the moment he was told that the room was his to have. A space for himself in the apartment that was too small for another one, and the meaning behind the gesture was almost enough for him to throw open the door and apologize for cutting the man off so abruptly. But then he remembered the letters, bared for all the world to see. A years worth of conversation and back-and-forths, tokens offered up like portals to that far off land he spent so much time _not_ thinking about.

He felt small. He didn't know what to do. He tried grasping physically for something to take his mind of the sensation.

He felt nothing at all.


End file.
